Roy Orbison, Walker Brothers
The Yardbirds made their one and only visit to Australia and New Zealand early in 1967 as part of a triple-headline package tour called The Big Show which featured Roy Orbison and the Walker Brothers, plus various Australian and New Zealand support acts such as Johnny Young, Jeff St. John and the Id, Thursday's Children, the Mixtures, Phil Jones and the Unknown Blues, Bev Harrell & the Third Party and Larry's Rebels. The local tour manager was Harry M. Miller. On January 9, 1967, The Yardbirds travelled back to London from the United States. Peter Grant took over management from Simon Napier-Bell and helped organise the Australasian tour. Lew Grade was involved in linking the band up with the Walker Brothers, beginning with the Singapore leg. Roy Orbison joined them for the Australian and New Zealand legs. The combined Asian / Australasian tour was a success for the band. It was their initial as a four-piece, with Jimmy Page on lead guitar after the November 1966 departure of Jeff Beck. For the first time they made some good money from a tour, due in no small part to new manager Peter Grant, whose hands-on style and astute guardianship of their finances meant that the musicians received some due reimbursement for their efforts. Under the previous management a combination of constant touring, recording and promotional work left the Yardbirds worn out and with precious little monetary reward. So it was that the Australasian tour represented the beginning of a new phase for the band and an 18 month period during which they enhanced their already enviable live performance reputation, had a checkered career in the studio, and lay the foundations for the later success of Jimmy Page's new Yardbirds, in the form of Led Zeppelin. The shows show an early version of Jimmy Page with violin bow and Fender Telecaster. This was to become an integral part of the Yardbirds performance, in numbers such as the I'm A Man finale of 1966-7, and later in the recording of Tinker Tailor Soldier Sailor, Glimpses, and - most famously - Dazed and Confused, which the band first became aware of in August of 1967. Prior to coming to Australia the Yardbirds had spent the previous cold, northern winter Christmas - New Year period of 1966-7 in the United States, before returning to London on 9 January. During the following week the change of manager from Simon Napier-Bell to Peter Grant took place. They then boarded a flight to Singapore where they arrived on the 16th. After playing a gig at the National Theatre on 17 January, they headed off to Australia, where between 21 and 28 January they performed two shows each night at venues booked in the major capital cities of Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Brisbane. They also had a number of interviews and performed live for a television program in Melbourne. The tour took place in the middle of the Australian summer, and the hot weather was a decided change much appreciated by the band members. The Australian leg was followed by a brief visit to New Zealand for performances at Christchurch, Wellington, Hamilton and Auckland, ending on 2 February 1967. The Yardbirds then returned home to England via various routes in time for a Paris show on 11 February. A live television concert in Germany on 15 March provides an audiovisual record of the band around the time of their Australasian tour. The original Australian television footage has not been located.